


coin check

by KestralWatcher



Series: saving space [6]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Canon Character of Color, Family, Found Family, Gen, Military, Mission Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:00:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26162284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KestralWatcher/pseuds/KestralWatcher
Summary: So far, Nile finds three significant things wrong with this mission.One: Despite everyone’s repeated assurances, she still doesn’t feel one hundred percent confident in taking on such a crucial solo role for this job.Two: She is in the United States, so close to Chicago, and has never felt so far away.Three: She is wearing an Air Force uniform.Nile's first solo undercover role brings her home.
Series: saving space [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1870753
Comments: 29
Kudos: 240





	coin check

**Author's Note:**

> Canon compliant with the film, but a bit hand-wavy about the credits scene.
> 
> No beta, we die like immortals.

So far, Nile finds three significant things wrong with this mission.

One: Despite everyone’s repeated assurances, she still doesn’t feel one hundred percent confident in taking on such a crucial solo role for this job.

Two: She is in the United States, so close to Chicago, and has never felt so far away.

Three: She is wearing an _Air Force_ uniform.

It all makes sense on paper like it usually does when Copley presents them with potential missions. Now that Andy is recovered and the entire team is fully mobile again, more action has involved travel to countries outside of where they had been laying low in Italy. Nile misses the house that has become her first real home since she enlisted in the Marines.

Traveling in the United States (and even that one trip to Vancouver) feels like home in a completely different way, but it’s still not Chicago.

Instead, this is Baltimore.

The rest of the team remains in Washington, DC, so Joe and Andy can prepare for the second part of the job. Nicky’s American accent is truly terrible (and Joe had looked horrified by the idea of Nicky cutting the hair that is now past his ears for such a temporary job), so Nile is the only option for the first half.

Nile is to meet Copley’s contact in Baltimore to accept a USB drive. She’ll hand it over to Andy and Joe, posing as an ex-pat couple, to plant at the Israeli embassy’s annual Yom Ha'atzmaut celebration. Then, they’ll all fade back into the shadows as, hopefully, all hell breaks loose, which will lead right back to—

Nile hits the breaks as four kids in dirt bikes fly through the intersection, ignoring any rules of the road. The rental Prius (she convinced Joe it was a reservation mix-up) screeches to a halt. She squeezes the steering wheel and gasps for breath until someone behind her lays on the horn, and she has to resume driving.

No more maniacs on dirt bikes try to kill themselves with her car, and ten minutes later, Nile parks in a garage next to the conference center (seventh floor in the back, where Copley’s info said the cameras were all out). She tugs the blue suit jacket off its hanger in the backseat and dons it and the matching flight cap, pausing to examine her reflection in the car window.

Today, she is not USMC Corporal Nile Freeman. She has not been that person in a long time. Today, she is USAF Technical Sergeant Julia Davis, attending a cybersecurity trade show at the Baltimore Convention Center.

(“It could be worse, I suppose,” Nile had told Nicky and Joe back at the DC hotel as she prepped her uniform with the pins and ribbons necessary for this persona. “It could be a Space Force uniform.”)

She checks into the convention at the registration desk, collecting her swag bag and draping the nametag lanyard around her neck. Then, she has a handful of hours to circle the vendor booths and hop into a couple of info sessions, cementing her presence at the convention by exchanging polite greetings with others in military uniform.

Nile is enough of a nerd to have embraced the needs of her current lifestyle, so she does legitimately find the content of the conference interesting. She can’t resist shooting a few texts to the others throughout the afternoon. (To Nicky: _Watch out, we’re gonna replace you with an armed drone soon_ ; to Copley: _This program might be relevant to your interests_ , with a picture of a vendor booth specializing in facial recognition; to Andy: _I forgot how much I hate these dress shoes_.)

(Joe texts back an hour later: _Watch out, we’re gonna replace YOU with a bunch of memes and a knife taped to a Roomba_.)

After the final session wraps up, she places herself in the sightlines of a trio in Navy white and fiddles with her smartphone until a sharp but friendly, “Hey, Tech Sergeant!” rings out from their direction. When she looks up, the lieutenant in the group waves her over.

“Sir,” she says, lifting her chin in greeting.

“You here alone?” asks the LT.

Nile ignores the immediate gut clench that accompanies the innocent question. She’s already spent too much time with Andy. This was the plan, after all: Get an invite to wherever the military folks at this convention have decided to gather for dinner. That’s where she’d accept the drop. “Yeah,” she says. “Unit only had the budget to send one of us, and I won the coin toss. Was googling for a place to eat, unless you’ve got a suggestion.”

“Feel free to join us,” the lone woman of the trio says. “The guys from up at Warfield recommended a pub in the Inner Harbor. We’ve been spreading the word.”

Like Nile, the petty officer has a bundle of braids twisted at the back of her neck in a bun. Nile experiences a moment of disassociation, in which the woman was her in another life if she’d chosen a tech track in the Navy rather than jumping at the single open Marine combat slot from which her recruiter had tried to dissuade her. She does her best to cover her brief hesitation with a return grin. “Thanks, I’d love to.”

The camaraderie as she slots herself into the group is instantaneous. Within minutes, she’s exchanging woes with Petty Officer Wright about being a black woman in a male-dominated field. It’s so easy to translate her experience in the Marines to this Air Force cover that Nile ends up hyper-aware of every word, terrified that she’ll get comfortable and an offhand comment will show her hand. She pulls her flight cap out of her pocket and fiddles with the unfamiliar fabric as a reminder touchstone.

After about fifteen minutes, their cluster expands to include a group of soldiers and a pair of Coast Guard officers, and they trek out of the convention center in the humid summer evening. A short walk to the Inner Harbor leads them to one of the shopping pavilions, and of all places, an Irish-style pub. Another half dozen in a mixture of service uniforms have already gathered in the bar area. Nile sits with Wright at a high-top table, and two men in Air Force uniforms join them. They absently greet the women before returning to their animated conversation about a home improvement project, then the two Coasties claim the final seats.

Despite the immortality that stretches the potential years before her, Nile is still younger than 30. She finds herself fortunate to have found three families in her life. Her biological family, who she still mourns every day. Her immortal family, three (and hopefully, someday, four) extraordinary people who have tucked her into their existence with love and warmth. And in between, the one she thought lost forever after being kidnapped from the middle of a FOB in fucking Afghanistan (seriously, Andy, WTF)—the military, where she found her place despite all the cards stacked against her. And it amazes her that this disparate group of service members from every branch of the military and all over the country, together only by virtue of being TDY at the same trade show, have automatically banded together as a cohort and welcomed her in without question simply because of the uniform she wears.

(She still wishes it was a Marine uniform. She’s still glad she refused Copley’s original cover with the rank of lieutenant—no stolen valor for her, thank you very much.)

Dinner is over, but the crowd is nowhere close to dissipating. The Coasties head to the bar, but Wright’s coworkers claim the empty seats. The Navy and Air Force lieutenants are trading anecdotes about Cancun when Wright tugs at Nile’s sleeve and tilts her head. A silent request in the common tongue of the American female. Nile drains the last of her single beer, glad the USAF master sergeant next to her has stuck to Coke and that therefore her low alcohol consumption is not worthy of comment, and follows Wright to the bathroom.

They do their business and finish washing their hands. Nile catches Wright’s obvious scan of the room and pauses, waiting until the other woman locks their gazes in the mirror. Wright draws an item from her pocket but keeps her fist clenched tight.

“Our mutual friend promised that this would end up in the correct hands,” Wright says.

Nile dips her chin, surprised and slightly pleased that Wright is the contact and that she wouldn’t have to spend the rest of the evening on edge. “I promise it will.” She accepts the thumb drive Wright passes her and slips it into her own pocket.

It doesn’t contain classified military information. Nile would have forced the team to refuse the job if that was the case. Instead, the USB supposedly carries doorbell camera footage of a military officer with security clearance holding a conversation with an unknown figure in a language the officer is not supposed to know. Nile is still not completely clear on why the Israeli government deserves this information rather than the American. However, she trusts Andy’s assessment of the situation and _definitely_ understands that she may never truly understand the clusterfuck that is the Middle East. (Joe and Nicky fully admit to not understanding it either, and they were _there_ for a lot of it.)

The women exit the restroom and follow the repetitive metallic clinking coming from the bar. Most of the restaurant has fallen silent as the other diners observe a military tradition they’ve probably never heard of. A cheer rises when Wright and Nile come into sight.

“Waiting on you, ladies!” Wright’s LT shouts over the din.

Wright’s peal of laughter chimes through the bar, an invisible weight clearly lifted from her shoulders, and she digs out her wallet. Nile is a step behind her in making the same action, even though she already knows the effort is futile.

“Shit,” Nile says, as she holds open her wallet at the same time that Wright presents her challenge coin and slaps it on the nearest table. “Forgot to switch it over when I packed for this trip.”

A second cheer goes around the bar as all the military folk tuck away their coins. Nile accepts the back slaps as she steps up to the bar and drops her credit card on the wood. It’s only about two dozen people. The drink bill won’t be that high.

Besides, it’s worth every penny for this brief time of feeling at home.

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Baltimore’s dirt bike kids are a genuine menace to vehicular traffic.
> 
> 2\. Yom Ha'atzmaut: Israel’s independence day
> 
> 3\. I worked in downtown Baltimore/the Inner Harbor area for 12 years. Tir Na Nog is still my favorite place to eat when I attend conventions in the city.
> 
> 4\. LT: lieutenant; FOB: forward operating base; TDY: temporary duty (business trip)
> 
> 5\. Find more info about the [military challenge coin check](https://www.itstactical.com/intellicom/reading/challenge-coin-rules-history-and-tradition/).
> 
> 6\. I’m not military, but I’ve been adjacent to it my entire life. I have a very mixed view of the American military complex, but I hope I do justice in this fic to those who serve and that I capture the lovely sense of comradery that is always there, and that I have been privileged to be part of. (And yes, a story with this many military characters means that I definitely snuck my spouse in with a cameo.)


End file.
